A friend's 15 year-old son was found deceased and was determined to have died from a methadone overdose. His labs showed no evidence of chronic opiate or any other type of drug use and his methadone level was low. Does anybody know what a lethal range of methadone is?

sorry to hear about such a young person dying from this.actually the real 'lethal" dose of most meds,espescially anything narcotic,really depends more on the individual and just how tolerant(how used to it the body has become?)that particular person actually is.was he really totally unexperienced with the use of meth or did he do this more regularly,this would really be the determining factor in most cases of narcotic type overdose.for what you have stated as such a low "overdose" dose for him,I am willing to bet that he either had never actually done this drug before or that he hadn't done it for very long,since it took only a very low dose to actually kill him.

meth is also a bit different as it has a very long "halflife" which just means it stays in the system much longer than most other meds would.this could possibly have contributed in some way as well.in orse to really get the best answers on this,your freind should really be asking some in depth questions to the medical examiner who determined the cause of death.he would be able to tell her much more exacting info than anyone else possibly could.

did they just determine the cause of his death strictly by a tox screen alone or did they actually do an autopsy?just curious.i am wondering just how low that low really was and could something else also have been a contributing factor.you just don't hear alot about people actually ODing on something like methadone itself.there is usually at least one or two other drugs in the system or alcohol or some other factor also involved in the resulting overdose,or actual cause of death.

i really do feel or you and the mom of this child,how really tragic,losing a child.every parents worst possible nightmare.you Do have my deepest sympathies to you and his mom.quite honestly,if she is really in need of much more info,have her contact the medical examiner who did his autopsy or determined his cause of death.peace,**